by Sally Morgan
Aah, I can’t really say what will happen. I s’pose it don’t concern me no more.
As for my people, some of them are naughty, they drink too much. Grog’s a curse, I’ve seen what it can do. They got to give it up. They got to show the white man what they made of.
Do you think we’ll get some respect? I like to think the black man will get treated same as the white man one day. Be good, wouldn’t it? By gee, it’d be good.
The bird call
When Nan finished telling me her story, I was filled with conflicting emotions. I was happy for her because she felt she’d achieved something. It meant so much to be able to talk and to be believed. But I was sad for myself and my mother. Sad for all the things Nan felt she couldn’t share.
Although, there was one thing I had learnt; that had quite surprised me. Nan’s voice had changed as she reminisced. She could speak perfect English when she wanted to, and usually did, only occasionally dropping the beginning or ending of a word. But in talking about the past, her language had changed. It was like she was back there, reliving everything. It made me realise that at one stage in her life it must have been difficult for her to speak English, and therefore to express herself.
But this, too, only made me even more aware of how much we still didn’t know. My mind went over and over her story; every word, every look. I knew there were great dark depths there, and I knew I would never plumb them.
I felt, for Mum’s sake, I should make one last effort to find out about her sister. So a few nights later, when Nan and I were on our own, I said, ‘There’s something I want to ask you. I know you won’t like it, but I have to ask. It’s up to you whether you tell me anything or not.’
Nan grunted. ‘Ooh, those questions, eh? Well, ask away.’
‘Okay. Has Mum got a sister somewhere?’
She looked away quickly. There was silence, then, after a few seconds, a long, deep sigh.
When she finally turned to face me, her cheeks were wet. ‘Don’t you understand yet,’ she said softly, ‘there are some things I just can’t talk ’bout.’ Her hand touched her chest in that characteristic gesture that meant her heart was hurting. It wasn’t her flesh and blood heart. It was the heart of her spirit. With that, she heaved herself up and went out to her room.
I went to bed with a face full of tears and a mind full of guilt. I was so insensitive, sometimes. I should have known better.
The early morning brought some peace. I would never ask her another thing about the past. And I had hope. She hadn’t extinguished my small shred of hope. Why, she’d even admitted that she was pregnant before she had Mum. That was such a big thing. For the moment, it would have to be enough. I stretched and shouted towards the ceiling. ‘I’m not giving up, God. Not in a million years. If she’s alive, I’ll find her, and I expect you to help!’
One night later that week, Nan called me out to her room.
‘What on earth are you doing?’ I laughed when I found her with both arms raised in the air and her head completely covered by the men’s singlet she was wearing.
‘I’m stuck,’ she muttered, ‘get me out.’ I pulled the singlet off and helped her undress. It had become a difficult task for her lately. Her arthritis was worse and cataracts now almost completely obscured her vision.
‘Can you give me a rub?’ she asked. ‘The Vaseline’s over there.’ I picked up the jar, dobbed a big, greasy lump of it onto her back and began to rub. Nan loved Vaseline. Good for keeping your body cool and moist, she always told me. She had a lot of theories like that. I continued to massage her in silence for a few minutes.
‘Ooh, that’s good, Sally,’ she murmured after a while. As I continued to rub, she let out a deep sigh and then said slowly, ‘You know, Sal … all my life, I’ve been treated rotten, real rotten. Nobody’s cared if I’ve looked pretty. I been treated like a beast. Just like a beast of the field. And now, here I am … old. Just a dirty old blackfella.’
I don’t know how long it was before I answered her. My heart felt cut in half. I could actually see a beast in a field. A work animal, nothing more.
‘You’re not to talk about yourself like that,’ I finally replied in a controlled voice. ‘You’re my grandmother and I won’t have you talk like that. The whole family loves you. We’d do anything for you.’
There was no reply. How hollow my words sounded. How empty and limited. Would anything I said ever help? I hoped that she sensed how deeply I felt. Words were unnecessary for that.
When I finished rubbing, I helped her into her nightclothes. This was no mean feat, there were so many. It was well into winter now, and Nan was anxious about the cold. I pulled a clean men’s singlet over her head, then a fleecy nightgown and a bedjacket. While she pulled a South Fremantle football beanie down over her head, I covered her feet with two pairs of woollen socks. After that, she wound two long scarves around her neck.
‘Are you sure you’ll be warm enough?’ I asked sarcastically.
‘I think you better help me into that cardigan,’ she answered after a second’s thought, ‘better safe than sorry.’
Once that was on, I pulled back the rugs and she rolled in on top of her sheepskin. As I passed her a hot-water bottle, she said, ‘Do you know what I did? I put a wool rug under my sheet, it’ll keep out the draught.’
‘Good,’ I smiled as I tucked her in. ‘Do you want me to turn your heater on?’ Often, she had it going all night.
‘I’ll do without it, takes the oxygen out of the air.’
‘Okay. Remember when we were kids and you used to put all that newspaper between your sheets to keep warm?’ Nan chuckled. ‘We heard you every time you rolled over,’ I laughed.
‘That’s a good old standby, newspaper. Don’t you ever forget it.’
‘I won’t.’
‘Leave the light on tonight, it might help me sleep.’
‘You usually have it off.’
‘I know, but I can’t sleep with it off, so I might as well try with it on.’
I had half closed the door when she suddenly murmured, ‘Aah, Sal, you’re too good to me, too good …’
‘You’re my grandmother, I replied quietly, ‘how do you expect me to treat you?’
She never answered. Her eyes were closed.
I went straight to bed myself after that. I curled up and pretended I was in God’s womb. I felt so hurt. I wanted to contain the deep emotions that were threatening to swamp me. For the first time in my life, the darkness comforted me. I lay there in a tight little ball, thinking about Nan. I wondered why she couldn’t sleep. I knew it wasn’t her illness. It was a thing of the spirit. She was probably thinking back over her life. Pictures from the past were probably running through her mind. I prayed one of them wasn’t a beast in a field.
When Nan was getting ready to go home that weekend, she said, ‘You’ll keep what I told you safe, won’t you?’
‘Of course I will.’
‘You liked it?’
‘I thought it was real good.’
‘You see, Arthur’s not the only one with a good story.’
‘He sure isn’t!’
‘I’ll be back on Monday, bring you some goodies. Here,’ she squeezed my hand, ‘buy the kids something.’
‘You’ve got to stop giving me money,’ I protested.
‘Come on, Nan,’ Mum called from the front porch, ‘the dogs’ll be hungry for their tea.’
‘I’m coming,’ Nan replied crossly. Then, turning to me, she whispered, ‘She’s never worried about the dogs’ tea before, Sally.’
‘Well, she hasn’t got you to feed them now.’
‘Do her good to do a bit of work for a change,’ Nan chuckled. She loved being in a position of power over Mum. Whenever Mum growled at her or tried to hurry her along, she would say, ‘You speak to me like that again, Gladdie, and I’ll move in with Sally for good. Then you’ll be sorry.’ Poor Mum couldn’t win.
The weekend passed quickly. When Nan hadn’t arrived at my
place by ten o’clock Monday morning, I began to worry. The phone rang and I rushed to answer it.
‘Sally?’ It was Mum.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘She’s taken a sudden turn for the worse. The doctor says she can’t be moved.’
‘Is she conscious?’
‘At the moment, she’s slipping in and out.’
‘I’m coming over.’
‘Jill’s coming too.’
‘Good.’ I hung up. It’d come so suddenly. She’d been living with me for over six weeks. She hadn’t seemed like someone who was dying.
From then on, Nan was confined to bed. Jill, Mum and I took four-hourly shifts so she was never alone. Bill and David came when they could. Bill was a great help with the lifting. And when Helen was off duty, she also came and sat with Nan.
Poor Helen, Nan would go on and on about how useless doctors were. It was a sensitive area. No one had the courage to disagree with her.
One night, Jill and I sat watching Nan sleep. Jill whispered, ‘Doesn’t seem fair, does it?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, we’re only just coming to terms with everything, finding ourselves, what we really are. And now, she’s dying. She’s our link with the past and she’s going.’ I couldn’t look at Jill. She sighed, ‘With her gone, we could pass for anything. Greek, Italian, Indian … what a joke. We wouldn’t want to, now. It’s too important. It’d be like she never existed. Like her life meant nothing, not even to her own family.’
‘We’re all really changing. I know we don’t talk about it, but it’s there.’
‘When this is over,’ Jill said, ‘I’m going to stand up and be counted.’
I felt very close to Jill just then. We both stayed there quietly watching as Nan peacefully slept. It was a promise. A promise from our spirits to hers. We would never forget.
I got sick after that. Mum and Jill reckoned it was emotional, it probably was. I was so sick I couldn’t get out of bed without fainting. Paul’s mother moved in to look after me and the children. I was very angry with myself for being sick. I felt I should be with the rest of my family. They were all struggling on.
The atmosphere had been electric over the past week. We were all physically exhausted. Some days we walked around not saying anything, other days we joked about nothing at all, every now and then we fought. We all knew something more than Nan’s body was dying. She was a symbol. Part of us was going too. We couldn’t explain it. It was just a time none of us understood.
Things finally came to a head and Mum asked Ruth, my brother David’s wife, if she would mind doing the nightshift. Ruth was a trained nursing aide and had nursed many people with terminal illnesses. She was only too pleased to help. She’d wanted to all along, but knew we were all very sensitive, so had refrained from intruding.
It was Ruth, more than anyone, who understood Nan’s fear of going before she was ready. They had little talks about it, during which Ruth would reassure her. Nan and Ruth had conflicted in the past, they were both stubborn, but as Ruth nursed her so tenderly, she came to mean a great deal to Nan.
When I was a little better, I began visiting Nan again. It was lovely to hear her say, ‘Where’s my nursie, is she still here? What would I do without her, Sally, she’s so good to me.’ It made me want to cry when she talked like that. I felt it was a victory that Nan could accept the love that Ruth offered. I felt so proud of Ruth. I hoped that, one day, I could do something special for her.
By the time Nan had been bedridden well over a week, I began to worry she might have a slow, lingering death. I knew she was concerned she might lose her mental faculties before dying. She’d always made me promise that if I noticed she was going a bit funny, I’d tell her.
One night, I confided my fears to Ruth.
‘The doctors told us that, in the case of lung cancer, it could go to the brain. I suppose the longer it takes, the more likely it is to happen. Nan would hate that.’
‘Do you think we should pray?’ Ruth suggested.
‘I pray every night.’
‘No, I mean with her. It might help her to let go.’
‘It might be a good idea, we’d have to ask her, couldn’t force anything on her.’
We moved close to Nan’s bedside and clasped her hands.
‘Nan,’ Ruth said quietly, ‘can you hear me?’ Nan nodded. ‘Sally wants to talk to you, Nan.’
I squeezed her hand and then said gently, ‘Nan, we were wondering if you would like us to pray for you. We would ask God to take you quickly if you like. You know how Ruth’s told you you won’t go before you’re ready? Well, that’s true. We won’t pray unless you want us to. It’s up to you.’
Tears slowly slid from under her closed eyelids. She lay quietly for a few minutes, then squeezed both our hands and said firmly, ‘Do it. Please do it.’
I looked at Ruth. ‘You do it,’ she said.
We bowed our heads. What was I going to say? I tightened my grip on Nan’s hand, cleared my throat and said, ‘God … you know this is about Nan. We really love her and we know you do too. She’s tired of this world, now, she’s ready to go. We know you’ve got a good place up there. A big, old gum tree where she can sit and play her mouth organ. Arthur’s waiting for her and the others. Please show your mercy and take Nan quickly.’ When I finished, I couldn’t see for tears in my eyes. Ruth was crying too.
Nan squeezed both our hands and then gently let go. Within a few minutes, she was asleep.
The Silver Chain sister visited that afternoon. As I saw her to the door, she said, ‘Your grandmother’s changed. I think she’s decided to die.’
‘She has,’ I agreed. ‘It won’t be long now.’
She grasped my arm and looked at me with pity in her eyes, ‘You’re wrong, dear,’ she said, ‘I’ve seen this happen before, many, many times. They give up the will to live, but they don’t die, because their bodies just won’t let them. She has a very strong heart and a good pulse. It could be weeks.’
‘That won’t happen with her,’ I replied confidently. ‘She’ll be gone soon.’
The sister shrugged her shoulders sympathetically. ‘Don’t count on it, dear, you’ll only be disappointed. There’d be a chance if her pulse was weak, but it’s not. I think you should face up to the fact this could go on for quite a while.’
The following morning, my phone rang very early.
‘Hello,’ I said as I lifted the receiver.
‘I heard the bird call.’ It was Jill’s voice.
‘What bird call?’
‘This morning, about five o’clock. I heard it, Sally. It was a weird sound, like a bird call, only it wasn’t. It was something spiritual, something out of this world. I think she’ll be going soon.’
After breakfast, I hurried over. There was an air of excitement about the place. The heaviness that we’d all been living under seemed to have suddenly lifted.
Mum was mystified about the bird call. I think she felt a little left out. Jill couldn’t understand why Mum hadn’t heard it, it’d been so loud and gone on and on.
When I walked into Nan’s room, I couldn’t believe my eyes, she didn’t look sick any more. Her face was bright and she was propped up in bed, smiling. Something had definitely happened, but none of us knew what. Even Mum and Jill were happier and bustling around like their old selves.
‘Nan, you look really good,’ I said in surprise.
‘Feel good, Sal.’
I just stood there, smiling. She seemed so contented. Almost like she had a secret. I was so desperate to ask her about the call, but I didn’t know where to begin. I sat by the bed and patted her hand.
Just then, Mum popped in. ‘Doesn’t she look well, Sally,’ she said happily. ‘Look at her face, it looks different.’
‘Sure does.’
‘Get me some toast, Gladdie,’ Nan said cheekily, ‘I’m hungry.’ Mum rushed out with tears in her eyes.
‘Nan,’ I said slowly as she looked at me,
‘about that call, you weren’t frightened when you heard it, were you?’
‘Ooh, no,’ she scoffed, ‘it was the Aboriginal bird, Sally. God sent him to tell me I’m going home soon. Home to my own land and my own people. I got a good spot up there, they all waitin’ for me.’
A lump formed in my throat so big I couldn’t speak, let alone swallow. Finally, I murmured, ‘That’s great Nan …’
Mum popped back in with tea and toast. ‘’Bout time,’ Nan chuckled. She ate a little then lay back. ‘Think I’ll sleep now,’ she sighed. We tiptoed out.
‘Tell me about the call again,’ I said to Jill.
Jill’s face was a mixture of fear, amazement and triumph as she described to Mum and I what happened.
‘Wish I’d heard it,’ sighed Mum.
‘Me too,’ I said enviously.
Later, I whispered to Mum, ‘You know, Jill must be very special to have heard that call.’ Mum agreed. We both wondered what Jill’s future held.
Nan had a very peaceful day that day. A happy day. The intense feeling that had surrounded our house for so long was gone, replaced by an overwhelming sense of calm.
At five-thirty the following morning, Ruth rang for an ambulance. Nan had insisted on it.
As they wheeled her out, she grasped Mum’s hand one last time. There was an unspoken message in her eyes as she whispered, ‘Leave my light burning for a few days.’
They placed her in the ambulance and Ruth climbed in beside her. Mum stood silently watching, accepting Nan’s choice. Knowing that this was her final sacrifice. She wanted our old family home free of death.
My phone rang at seven that same morning.
‘Sally? It’s Ruth. Nan died twenty minutes ago. It was very peaceful.’
‘Thanks,’ I whispered.
I slowly replaced the receiver. I felt stiff. I couldn’t move. Tears suddenly flooded my cheeks. For some reason, Jill’s words from the previous day began echoing inside of me. I heard the bird call, I heard the bird call. Around and around.
